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Black Wings of Cthulhu Volume 1 (2010)

Lovecraft fans know that Lovecraftian fiction is an addiction. You may drop the habit for a little while, but the tentacles and the damned tomes are always calling to you, waiting for your next binge. Lovecraft fans also know well the name S.T. Joshi: critic, novelist, leading authority on Lovecraft the man. He’s edited countless books of fiction, Lovecraftian or otherwise, and he has been one of horror and weird fiction fan’s staunchest allies.

In Black Wings of Cthulhu Joshi brings you, as the cover declares, twenty-one finely crafted tales of Lovecraftian horror to give you a fix when your next craving hits. Some are pastiches, while others use the core of cosmic horror to tell chilling tales that evoke terror without the weight of the mythos and its language. If you’re expecting only pure Cthulhu Mythos tales, you might be disappointed, but if you embrace the edges of weird fiction, there’s not a dud here, and there are some unqualified masterpieces, such as Laird Barron’s now-classic The Broadsword, and the always-excellent Caitlyn R Kiernan’s Pickman’s Other Model.

The one, the only: S.T. Joshi

If you feel like sampling some of what Black Wings of Cthulhu Volume One has on offer, Dread Central has been kindly sharing a PDF of one of the stories, Michael Shea’s Copping Squid. Head on over to give it a download.

It’s worth mentioning that, while I love Lovecraft, like any writer, his fiction has it’s uneven spots. There are a number of stories that just aren’t that great. Some early stories like Polaris are interesting from an academic perspective, but not excellent in and of themselves. Might be worthwhile to jump through some of the well known high points, then dive back into the lesser known material.